#WeatherSays | This image is a depiction of the Sun's path over a period from February - September 2020, and will continue for one year. One photo from each cloud-free day has been blended to make a figure of 8 which is called an #analemma.
➡️The north-south component of the analemma results from the change on Sun's declination due to the tilt of Earth's axis of rotation.
➡️The east-west component results from the non-uniform rate of change of the Sun's right ascension, governed by combined effects of Earth's axial tilt and orbital eccentricity.
➡️This particular analemma is rather special. It contains an annular eclipse right on top of the figure. The solstice eclipse which happened on 21 June in India. This is called a "Tutelemma".
➡️To make this image, the camera was kept facing the same direction (south) and at the same altitude above the horizon (45°) for each shot at my home terrace in Gurugram.
➡️The background image is of Chilla Sahib Gurudwara at Sirsa, using exact same direction (south) and altitude above horizon 43.8° as Sirsa is 1.2° North of Gurugram.
➡️The effect of the difference between the longitudes of Gurugram and Sirsa is compensated by clicking the Gurugram images earlier than the predicted eclipse time so that the Sun's position in the sky remains the same.
➡️The image of the Annular eclipse was clicked at Sirsa at the time of the middle of annularity, with the exact same camera orientation as the #GurudwaraChillaSahib.
The imaging process to complete the Tutelemma will continue till February 2021.
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
While searching for life in the Gulf of Mexico, researchers pulled out a new bizarre-looking species of isopod, whose head resembles the Darth Vader from Star Wars!
This new-found crustacean, named Bathonymus yucatanensis, has 14 legs and is around 26 cm long — approximately 25 times larger than its closest relative, the common woodlouse.
While these blonde creatures seem pretty scary, the "Vanilla Vaders" are, in fact, harmless to humans.
Their huge size is only due to deep-sea gigantism — a phenomenon wherein ocean dwellers grow bigger than their terrestrial relatives due to lack of sunlight.
This super-Earth is a rocky world, on which a year is equal to just 11 Earth days.
The short orbit is down to the red dwarfs being a lot smaller than the Sun that centres our solar system. But the smaller sizes also make their gravitational fields less expansive than the Sun's.
Therefore, Ross 508b revolves around its red dwarf at a distance of just 5 million km. Mercury, in comparison, is about 60 million km from the Sun.
The short distance between this super-Earth & its red dwarf begs the question: how could it possibly be habitable?
#Japan is making grand plans of creating interplanetary #trains and champagne flute-like glass habitats in its bid to send and host humans on the #Moon and #Mars!
An interplanetary transportation system dubbed the 'Hexatrack', which maintains a gravity of 1G during long-distance travel to mitigate the effects of prolonged exposure to low gravity, has been proposed by #Japanese researchers.
The #trains will also possess 'Hexacapsules', which are essentially hexagon-shaped capsules with a moving device in the middle.
In 2012, the almost-complete skeleton of a new kind of #dinosaur was found in the northern Patagonia region of #Argentina.
The dinosaur has been christened #Meraxes gigas. The generic epithet is an ode to a dragon in the #GameOfThrones series.
Standing at the height of 11 m (36 ft) and weighing roughly 4000 kgs, the #dinosaur sported several crests, bumps and horns on its skull, which lent it a menacing appearance.
But the highlight of the findings is that the dinosaur had teeny-tiny arms, just like the #Trex!
Dr Jose, along with an international research team from the US, UK and Australia, will be examining the Galactic Centre Cloud (GCC) — the central molecular zone of our Milky Way — in April 2023.
They have been allotted 27.3 hours over the access period of 12 months.